Friday, November 27, 2015

When we earnestly call the Buddha’s Name with
a fullness of heart while listening to the Dharma, our lives gradually become
directed toward the Buddha. However, as our recitation of the nembutsu deepens,
there is an eventual reversal in the direction of that nembutsu. When we say
the nembutsu, we are directing ourselves toward the Buddha as we call out the Buddha’s
Name and think on the Buddha. However, at the same time, we also awaken to a movement
in the opposite direction. That is, we hear the voice of the Buddha that is
directing itself to us, as it names itself and calls out to us. Here, a
transcendent religious experience takes place, which we awaken to at the
deepest level of our consciousness.

.....................

Normally, we are always trying to cram
ourselves full of things. We are constantly filling ourselves with
self-attachment and ego, and so we are unable to see or hear anything truly.
However, when our selves gradually become emptied, then the eyes of our mind
will open and we will finally be able to hear things for the first time. And we
are able to hear other persons’ voices of distress and pain as well.

When we come to know keenly and fully that the
current state of our existence is false, then we will become able to hear what
we had not been able to hear up until now. We will be able to see what up until
now we had not been able to see. Within this structure, finally, we become able
to hear the voice of the Buddha within the nembutsu. This is how saying the
nembutsu works in Shin Buddhism.

Notes: Nembutsu is the recitation of ‘Namu
Amida Butsu (literally, ‘Hail to Amitabha Buddha’), the final syllable of Butsu
often being dropped; Shin Buddhism is a branch of Pure Land Buddhism in which
Amitabha is called upon for salvation; Takamaro Shigaraki was a Japanese Buddhist
philosopher and Shin Buddhist priest and former president of Ryukoku
University, Tokyo, Japan. The above quotation is taken from Shigaraki's wonderful book 'Heart of the Shin Buddhist Path,' published by Wisdom Publications. A very important work on the subject of Shin Buddhism.

According to tradition, Buddha’s words were
memorised by his cousin & attendant the Venerable Ananda, and then recited
by Buddhists through the ages. Eventually, after several hundred years, these
words were written down and became “sacred texts.” Historically, there have
been many different collections of Buddhist teachings, each promoted by
different branches of Buddhism. Today, there are three such collections used by
Buddhists across the world – the Pali, Chinese & Tibetan. These collections,
known in Sanskrit as the Tripitaka, are complemented by commentaries &
other subsequent writings also considered sacred by those that use them.
(Interestingly, at the time of Buddha, when the above verses were said to have
been originally uttered, Buddhist texts didn’t yet exist. Was Buddha referring
to contemporary non-Buddhist texts or predicting the formation of Buddhist
sacred texts in the future?)

Whether the term “sacred texts” used in verses
19 & 20 of the Dhammapada originally meant religious texts existing at the
time of Buddha or not, modern Buddhists can interpret these words as referring
to Buddhist sacred texts. Reciting such texts has a long history in Buddhism, sometimes
as an act of merit-making, sometimes with the intent of remembering &
reflecting upon them. It’s interesting, therefore, that Buddha states that
merely reciting these texts doesn’t bring much benefit. Instead, he teaches
that it’s in putting these teachings into practice that someone may “partake of
the blessings of a holy life.” (“Holy life” here indicates living a Buddhist
life based on the threefold training briefly described below. ‘Holiness’ in
this sense means practicing the Buddhist path, not being a kind of Ghandi or
Mother Teresa figure.)

In verse 20, Buddha describes several ways
that a wise person benefits from Buddhist practice – even if Buddhist texts are
little recited. Firstly, he talks of “putting the teaching into practice.” This
teaching includes the threefold training of wisdom, morality &
concentration (or, meditation). All major schools of Buddhism include these
three types of training, although the details & methods of training may
differ from school to school.

Secondly, Buddha promotes “forsaking greed,
hatred and delusion.” These are called the three unwholesome roots or three
poisons, and are considered the cause of suffering. To forsake them is to
remove the causes of suffering and therein achieve awakening (or
enlightenment). This awakening is the meaning of the phrase “true wisdom and
emancipated mind” in the verse. To achieve this emancipation is the result of
living the Buddhist life to its fruition, but even if we don’t reach full
awakening, we may still witness the reduction of the poisons in our lives to
good effect.

The benefits of living the Buddha’s teachings
to their conclusion is summed up in the words “clinging to nothing of this or
any other world, one indeed partakes of the blessings of a holy life.” This is
true freedom without clinging, clinging being an integral part of the arising
of suffering. Such absence of clinging must also include not clinging to the
Buddhist teachings themselves. For, if clung to, the idea of awakening
will prevent the realization of its reality. This fact reveals an important
reason why the recitation & remembrance Buddhist texts won’t lead to
awakening: awakening is beyond words, even those of Buddha!

This isn’t to say that Buddha’s teachings
should be shunned. They still supply us with the blueprints that most of us
need to enable us to awaken. Verses 19 & 20 are telling us that if we know,
understand & apply the basic teachings of Buddha to our lives consistently,
we will awaken. Cramming our minds full of texts but not putting them into
practice is useless if our intent is to become awakened. Ultimately, awakening
lies beyond the reaches of the intellect; it can be a useful tool, but it does
not liberate us.

All of this doesn’t mean that Buddhist texts shouldn’t
be studied or recited, of course. It simply means that these activities are no
substitute for actually walking the Buddhist path. We can study the teachings –
and we need to so to gain a sound idea of what Buddhism is all about – but it’s
in their application to our lives that they will truly benefit us. The wisdom
contained in Buddhist sacred texts like the Dhammapada is to be valued, but
only as far as it inspires in us a realisation of the “blessings of a holy
life.”

The Dhammapada ('Verses of Dharma' or 'Path of
Dharma') is an ancient Buddhist text that is said to contain some of the
Buddha's teachings in poetic form. The first chapter is called Yamakavagga,
'Chapter of Pairs,' and the above two verses are from this part of the book.

Saturday, November 7, 2015

Buddhism distinguishes two kinds of desire:
the first (tanha) to be abandoned and the second (chanda) to be
cultivated.

Tanha is the desire that arises from a basic
misunderstanding of the way things are: perceiving permanence, happiness and
selfhood where they do not exist. Desire for the pleasures to be had through
getting, getting rid of and becoming is tanha. Tanha leads to personal
suffering and is the basis of almost all social ills.

Chanda is the desire that arises from a
correct understanding of the way things are. At its heart lies the aspiration
for truth and goodness. Desire to do well, desire to act well, desire to act
kindly, desire to act wisely — all desires based on an
aspiration for the true and good lead to personal fulfillment and healthy
communities.

The distinction between chanda and tanha is
not philosophical but psychological. By looking closely at the raw experience
of life the distinction between desires that lead to genuine happiness and
those that do not becomes increasingly clear.

The above is extracted from the book ‘Without
and Within’ which is freely downloadable here. Ajahn Jayasaro was
ordained as a Buddhist monk in 1980 and studied with the famous Thai forest
monk Ajahn Chah. He was abbot of Wat Pa Nanachat in Northeast Thailand for
several years and now lives in a hermitage near the Khao Yai mountains.